The Colorado House gave initial approval to a $19 billion state budget Wednesday evening after a nearly seven-hour debate that included squabbles over funding for private prisons and government spending for erectile dysfunction.

Rep. Cheri Gerou, R-Evergreen, chairwoman of the legislature’s Joint Budget Committee, said the budget stands up for seniors and students, along with providing plans for the state’s future. Fellow committee member Rep. Claire Levy, D-Boulder, urged her Democratic colleagues to support the spending plan because it “reflects compromises on both sides.”

The budget, which is for the 2012-13 fiscal year that begins in July, features $7.5 billion in spending from the state’s general fund — the largest single pot of money in the budget and the one over which lawmakers have the most discretion. General-fund spending for 2012-13 would be about 6.5 percent more than what lawmakers approved for the 2011-12 fiscal year.

Because of a more optimistic state-revenue forecast issued in March, lawmakers were able to fund a $98.5 million property-tax break for seniors that had been the largest single point of contention. The rosier budget picture also allowed lawmakers to keep per-pupil spending levels for K-12 students at current-year levels and to keep higher-education funding close to the current level.

The budget also would close Colorado State Penitentiary II in Cañon City, saving $13.5 million a year by 2013.

Rep. Mark Waller, R-Colorado Springs, offered an amendment, which passed with bipartisan support, that takes $4.2 million from the Department of Corrections to increase funding for full-day kindergarten. Waller argued that inmate populations had been falling and that the money could be spared to help more kids get into full-day kindergarten.

But Democrats, the minority in the House, also proposed multiple amendments to take millions specifically from private prisons and transfer the money to programs for early-childhood literacy, preschool programs and services for veterans and the developmentally disabled, and for cash payments to the disabled.

All those amendments failed amid Republican arguments that such cuts to private prisons could cause economic devastation to small towns on the Eastern Plains.

One of the livelier moments in the budget debate came when Rep. Dan Pabon, D-Denver, offered an amendment that would have barred the use of government funds for vasectomies or to treat erectile dysfunction “so long as these funding prohibitions for women’s health exist in law.” By law, state funds cannot be used for abortions.

“We don’t want to have a double standard in this building,” Pabon said.

Gerou said the amendment detracted from the “serious work” of the budget, and Pabon later withdrew it, but only after making multiple puns.

“There’s no need to get snippy,” he deadpanned. “I know this amendment hits many below the belt.”

Republicans added an amendment that would defund the Colorado Office of Consumer Counsel, the agency assigned to represent utility ratepayers’ interests before the Public Utilities Commission. Rep. Spencer Swalm, R-Centennial, said the office had been doing a poor job of keeping utility rates low and that the agency should either “do their job or go out of business.”

Swalm’s amendment would save $897,250 and eliminate seven positions. Democrats said it was irresponsible to eliminate the agency that protects utility consumers, which include businesses.

The Republican-led House must approve the budget a second time before it can go to the Democratic-controlled Senate, which is likely to strip out some amendments and add its own, ultimately sending the bill to a conference committee.

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Police who find suspected drugs during a traffic stop or an arrest usually pause to perform a simple task: They place some of the material in a vial filled with liquid. If the liquid turns a certain color, it’s supposed to confirm the presence of cocaine, heroin or other narcotics.